In this study, we extracted facial action units (AUs) data during a Hearthstone tournament to investigate behavioural differences between expert, intermediate, and novice players. Our aim was to obtain insights into the nature of expertise and how it may be tracked using non-invasive methods such as AUs. These insights may shed light on the endogenous responses in the player and at the same time may provide information to the opponents during a competition. Our results show that player expertise may be (...) characterised by specific patterns in facial expressions. More specifically, AU17 (chin raiser), AU25 (lips apart), and AU26 (jaws drop) intensity responses during gameplay may vary according to players' expertise. Such results were obtained by training a random forest classifier to test whether we can use these three AUs alone to accurately detect players' expertise. The classifier reached 0.75 accuracy on 5-fold cross-validation, after balancing the class weights, and 0.85 after having applied the Synthetic Minority Over-sampling Technique (SMOTE) function. These results suggest that AUs can be effectively used to discriminate different levels of expertise in competitive video game players. (shrink)

Quakers express their faith by refraining from war, often actively opposing it. In modern Quakerism, this is known as the ‘Peace Testimony’. This commonly has a negative and positive construal: it is seen as a testimony against war, and as a testimony to the possibility and goodness of peaceful lives. This paper offers an account of how these aspects of the Peace Testimony are unified in and grounded on a corporate experience of being led by God into a way of (...) life that renders war unthinkable. My goal is to make sense of Friends’ activism in light of their religious experience and to introduce some ideas from Quaker practical theology to philosophers and theologians more generally. I begin by considering the role of what Rachel Muers calls ‘negative testimony’ in Quaker peace work, arguing that we risk misunderstanding this work if we do not see the unity of the Peace Testimony’s negativity and Friends’ positive peace-making endeavors. I then turn to the Testimony’s ground, which I claim can be nothing other than an experience of direct revelation. I conclude by arguing that prominent objections to pacifism, such as Elizabeth Anscombe’s, hold little weight against the Peace Testimony. (shrink)

is not about traditional skeptical thinkers like Descartes and Hume. Instead, it is about some of the ideas of today’s ”skeptics” — people who try to debunk things that seem too odd or too spiritual. This site is not meant to encourage weird beliefs, but it might make you wonder whether skepticism is a weird belief too.

The twentieth century was a century of progress. During those hundred years, humanity progressed from a world without airplanes, computers, or modern medicine to a new era in which these technological miracles were commonplace. These technical achievements were not the only accomplishments of that fateful century. There also were vast changes in social thought, with great steps forward toward human equality and freedom — the struggle for racial equality, the recognition of women's rights, and the defeat of the new, unprecedented (...) menaces of Nazism and, in many places, of Communism. (shrink)

takes a stand for liberty, and explores important topics such as punishment, capitalism, and the limits of government. If you are sick of the left and tired of the right, you just might like this.

Many people regard the mind as something separate from the body. This includes many religious believers, who regard personality and self as attributes of an immortal soul. Some philosophers, relying on logic instead of faith, also have taken the position that the mind is distinct from the body and is not explainable in terms of bodily processes alone. The belief that a person is composed of a mind and a body, with neither one reducible to the other, has traditionally been (...) called dualism. (shrink)

critiques the degradation of the person in current philosophical thought. This page points out some challenges to behaviorism, eliminativism, postmodernism, and other antipersonal ideas.

One of the most important ongoing debates in the philosophy of mind is the debate over the reality of the first-person character of consciousness.[1] Philosophers on one side of this debate hold that some features of experience are accessible only from a first-person standpoint. Some members of this camp, notably Frank Jackson, have maintained that epiphenomenal properties play roles in consciousness [2]; others, notably John R. Searle, have rejected dualism and regarded mental phenomena as entirely biological.[3] In the opposite camp (...) are philosophers who hold that all mental capacities are in some sense computational - or, more broadly, explainable in terms of features of information processing systems.[4] Consistent with this explanatory agenda, members of this camp normally deny that any aspect of mind is accessible solely from a first-person standpoint. This denial sometimes goes very far - even as far as Dennett's claim that the phenomenology of conscious experience does not really exist. (shrink)

The main question of metasemantics, or foundational semantics, is why an expression token has the meaning (semantic value) that it in fact has. In his reading of Ludwig Wittgenstein’s later work, Saul Kripke presented a skeptical challenge that threatened to make the foundational question unanswerable. My first contention in this paper is that the skeptical challenge indeed poses an insoluble paradox, but only for a certain kind of metasemantic theory, against which the challenge effectively works as a reduc- tio ad (...) absurdum argument. My second contention is that as a result of rejecting the theory which entails a paradoxical outcome, we will see that the foundational question essentially involves a temporal dimension. After arguing that the skeptical challenge gives us a strong reason to adopt a historical view of meaning, I shall further argue against certain authors who claim that meanings not only have histories but futures as well, or that the meaning of a word may change retroactively in time as a consequence of counterfactual change in its future use. The major aim of the paper is thus to bring together the arguably interrelated debates about the skeptical challenge and temporal externalism in philosophy of language. (shrink)

There may be a limit on our capacity to suppress anthropocentric tendencies toward non-human others. Normally, we do not reach this limit in our dealings with animals, the environment, etc. Thus, continued striving to overcome anthropocentrism when confronted with these non-human others may be justified. Anticipation of super artificial intelligence may force us to face this limit, denying us the ability to free ourselves completely of anthropocentrism. This could be for our own good.

In a recent paper, Eleonore Stump argues that Aquinas thinks the acquired virtues are “not real at all” because they do not contribute to true moral life, which she argues is the life joined to God by the infused virtues and the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit. Against this, I argue in two stages that Aquinas thinks the acquired virtues are real virtues. First, I respond to Stump’s four arguments against the reality of the acquired virtues. Second, I (...) show four ways in which the acquired virtues contribute to the highest ethical life for Aquinas. (shrink)

En este texto nos proponemos abordar la última clase del semanario de Deleuze sobre el poder en Foucault a partir de dos momentos. El primero tiene que ver con el concepto de imagen y la interpretación sobre el cine que ya venía siendo una constante —aunque marginalmente— en estas clases de Deleuze. Seguidamente, el segundo momento tiene que ver con la relación entre poder y resistencia que arroja como resultado una interpretación del pensamiento de Foucault por parte de Deleuze como (...) una obra viva y en constante construcción. Así, cumpliremos con la exigencia de una lectura que invita a pensar en los conceptos como herramientas de análisis integradas al desarrollo de situaciones donde el poder se presenta como noción central. (shrink)

A scientific perspective is a particular way of regarding something, using a scientific method. Scientific methodology is defined as a mode of research in which a problem is identified, relevant data gathered, a hypothesis formulated, and then empirically tested. Viewed from such a perspective, Guru Nanak's life was a continuous process of scientific experimentation and statement. Guru Nanak's life and writings are abundant in several such examples wherein his scientific approach to resolving several real-life situations with logic and rationality is (...) evident. (shrink)

By tracing its own narrative from the feminist pragmatism of the 1980s-2000s back to the avant-la-lettre feminist pragmatism of the Progressive Era, this chapter explores the use of narrative within feminist pragmatism. It pays particular attention to uses of narrative in Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Anna Julia Cooper and Jane Addams to reveal the usefulness of narrative as a feminist pragmatist mode of inquiry and of elucidating meaning. The chapter concludes with a brief suggestion of where feminist pragmatist narrative may take (...) us next. (shrink)

The basic idea is to put qualia into equations (broadly understood) to get what might as well be called qualations. Qualations arguably have different truth behaviors than the analogous equations. Thus ‘black’ has a different behavior than ‘ █ ’. This is a step in the direction of a ‘calculus of qualia’. It might help clarify some issues.

Although trained in the Anglophone analytic tradition, the French education of his formative years seems to have left its mark on Ronnie de Sousa’s thinking and writing. He appeals to temperament as an explanation for fundamental attitudes to life: neither the quest for a source of meaning in God or nature, nor his own tendency to relish life’s meaninglessness can be grounded in reason. To show this, Ronnie has argued that there is no such thing as human nature, and that (...) appeals to evolution can neither guide us in choosing how to live, nor give us good reason to prefer the “normal” to the “deviant”. Instead, aesthetic reasons deserve to be given more weight than is granted by the alleged overriding character of morality. (shrink)

This is a translation of the short, third letter in G.E. Schulze's Aenesidemus, without its lengthy appendix. -/- Excerpts of the appendix which follows this letter have been translated into English by George di Giovanni in Between Kant and Hegel, eds. G. di Giovanni and H.S. Harris, (Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company Inc., 2000).

-/- In Kafka's work there are many examples of metamorphic instances. Die Verwandlung is obviously the first case that we are used to know as a real metamorphic example. However, it is not the only one, for examples Odradek, but also the way Kafka describes the encounter between characters or the characteristics of some of them (Das Schloss). The paper tries to conceptualize the metamorphosis through a distinction between two forms: (1) metamorphosis or transformation that allows us to know from (...) where what is transformed comes (start) and where it arrives (arrival); (2) becoming that shows a tension between two different conditions or that not allows us to grasp something because of his intangibility. All this will be examined using the monumental work of Deleuze and Guattari and a phenomenology of metamorphosis developed by Conci. (shrink)

It may be true that we are epistemically in the dark about various things. Does this fact ground the truth of fallibilism? No. Still, even the most zealous skeptic will probably grant that it is not clear that one can be incognizant of their own occurrent phenomenal conscious mental goings-on. Even so, this does not entail infallibilism. Philosophers who argue that occurrent conscious experiences play an important epistemic role in the justification of introspective knowledge assume that there are occurrent beliefs. (...) But this assumption is false. This paper argues that there are no occurrent beliefs. And it considers the epistemic consequences this result has for views that attempt to show that at least some phenomenal beliefs are infallible. (shrink)

This paper responds to two arguments that have been offered against the positing of ‘i-desires’, imaginative counterparts of desire supposedly involved in fiction, pretence, and mindreading. The Introspection Argument asks why, if there are both i-desires and desires, the distinction is so unfamiliar and hard to draw, unlike the relatively clear distinctions between perception and mental imagery, or belief and belief-like imagining. The Accountability Argument asks how it can make sense to treat merely imaginative states as revealing of someone’s psychology, (...) the way we do with responses to fiction. I argue that carefully considering the relationship between other states and their imaginative counterparts sheds light on how we should expect i-desires to differ from desires, and suggests that we may often be in states that are indeterminate, in limbo between the two categories. This indeterminacy explains why the distinction is often hard to draw, and why these states can be revealing about us even without being real desires. (shrink)

What does it mean to have “strong beliefs”? My thesis is that it can mean two very different things. That is, there are two distinct psychological features to which “strong belief” can refer, and these often come apart. I call the first feature epistemic confidence and the second identity centrality. They are conceptually distinct and, if we take ethnographies of religion seriously, distinct in fact as well. If that’s true, it’s methodologically important for the psychological sciences to have measures that (...) tease them apart. In this paper, I critique some measures that are currently in use and propose some strategies for developing measurement tools that track the distinction in question. (shrink)

Stringent non-consequentialist constraints on permitting horrendous evils pose a formidable challenge to the project of theodicy by limiting the ways in which it is permissible for God to do or allow evil for the sake of bringing about a greater good. I formulate a general and potent argument against all greater-good theodicies (which includes most theodicies) from the existence of robust side constraints on permitting evil. Then I contend that the argument fails. I begin by distinguishing between side constraints on (...) doing evil and side constraints on allowing evil, and then I draw on the work of David Lewis and Fiona Woollard to argue that, because of the unique ways that God is related to the world, it is plausible that God can both create and sustain our universe, despite all of its evils, without violating any of these constraints. (shrink)

In this paper we argue that moral deference is prima facie obligatory in cases in which the testifier is a member of a marginalized social group that the receiver is not and testifies about their marginalized experience. We distinguish between two types of deference: epistemic deference, which refers to believing p in virtue of trusting the testifier, and actional deference, which involves acting appropriately in response to the testimony given. The prima facie duty we propose applies to both epistemic and (...) actional deference, though defeaters may quash either or both obligations. Even if one fails to epistemically defer to the marginalized testifier, we argue that they may still be ethically obligated to act in accordance with their testimony. (shrink)

J.L. Austin argues that ordinary language should be used to identify when it is appropriate or inappropriate to make, accept, or reject knowledge claims. I criticize Austin’s account: In our ordinary life, we often accept justifications rooted in racism, sexism, ableism, and classism as reasons to dismiss knowledge claims or challenges, despite the fact such reasons are not good reasons. Austin’s Ordinary Language Epistemology (OLE) classifies the discounting of knowledge claims in classic cases of epistemic injustice as legitimate ordinary maneuvers. (...) I provide recommendations for revision of OLE and offer a means of distinguishing between dismissals in cases of epistemic injustice and their legitimate counterparts. (shrink)

A new strategy for moving forward in the characterization of the Global Neuronal Workspace (GNW) is proposed. According to Dehaene, Changeux and colleagues, broadcasting is the main function of the GNW. However, the dynamic network properties described by recent graph-theoretic GNW models are consistent with many large-scale communication processes that are different from broadcasting. We propose to apply a different graph-theoretic approach, originally developed for optimizing information dissemination in communication networks, which can be used to identify the pattern of frequency (...) and phase-specific directed functional connections that the GNW would exhibit only if it were a broadcasting network. (shrink)

When Pierre Bourdieu addresses the problem of why people from certain discriminated groups are hardly present in some fields, he emphasizes the role of stylistic factors that cannot be captured in terms of rules. An alternative explanation refers to split systems, both of which can be captured by means of rules.

Herhangi bir şeyi, kendisi dışında başka bir şeyle belirtmek olarak tanımlanabilen metafor; İslâm coğrafyasında, özellikle tasavvuf ve sûfizm çalışmalarında, önemli bir ifade yöntemi olarak kullanılmaktadır. Spesifik olarak edebî hikâyelerin ifadelerine daha güçlü, vurgulu ve manidar bir anlatım katabilmek adına, filozoflar sembolik ya da metaforik anlatım ve ifadelerden faydalanmışlardır. İslâm filozoflarından, yoğun olarak bu ifade dilini kullananlar başta Mevlânâ Celâleddîn-i Rumî olmak üzere; İbn Sînâ, Ahmed el-Gazâlî, Şehabeddîn Sühreverdî ve bu çalışmada üzerinde duracağım Mollâ Câmî (Mevlânâ Nureddîn Abdurrahîm el-Câmî)'dir. Mollâ Câmî; (...) Leyla ile Mecnun, Yûsuf ile Züleyha, Salaman ile Absal gibi derleme mesnevîleri İranlı klasik şairlerin sonuncusu sayılmasının yanı sıra Nefâhatü'l-üns kitabıyla birlikte tasavvuf felsefesinin de önemli kaynak ve bilginlerindendir. Bu çalışmada da Mollâ Câmî'nin eserlerinde bir ifade dili niteliğinde kullandığı metaforik anlatım ve ifadelere, bunların kullanım alanlarına, örneklendirmelerle değinilecektir. (shrink)

Members of marginalized communities are often accused of being "too sensitive" when subjected to supposedly harmless acts of microaggression. This paper explores a simulated society consisting of marginalized and non-marginalized agents who interact and may, based on their individually held convictions, commit acts of microaggressions. Agents witnessing a microaggression might condone, ignore or condemn such microaggressions, thus potentially influencing a perpetrator's conviction. A prototype model has been implemented in NetLogo, and possible applications are briefly discussed.

This paper argues for a ‘contextualist’ approach to teaching antisemitism in philosophy class. The traditional ‘systematic’ approach emphasizes recognizing and dismantling antisemitic aspects in canonical philosophical texts. The introduced contextualist approach broadens the perspective, treating philosophy as a continuous debate embedded in cultural realities. It focuses on historical controversies rather than isolated arguments, includes the voice and the perspectives of the oppressed, and so has the potential to broaden traditional philosophical canons. In the second half of the paper, we provide (...) a case study of the contextualist approach, applying it to the ‘Berlin antisemitism controversy’ of 1879/80. We argue that the contextualist approach is particularly valuable when dealing with antisemitism as it teaches students to analyze arguments within the socio-political landscape and to identify antisemitic elements. The students thereby acquire the skills to discern antisemitic argumentation in other contexts as well. We suggest that this approach could be used to teach other debates in the history of philosophy, especially those tackling race, sex, and gender issues. (shrink)

There are at least three interpretations that attempt to read from the Sense-Certainty Chapter a Hegelian theory of indexicals. First, the Impossibility of Singular Reference Reading understands Hegel as excluding in principle the possibility of any linguistic cognition of individuals. Second, the Theory of Reference Reading criticizes the first reading and interprets from Hegel the classical idea of direct reference theory. Third, Brandom’s Anaphoric Theory Reading suggests an alternative explanation while still defending the possibility of knowledge of individuals in Hegel. (...) I criticize the first two readings and argue that the third is the most exegetically and philosophically adequate interpretation. The first interpretation attempts to ascribe to Hegel a sort of skepticism, but this can be at most in a very restricted sense successful and the skepticism constructed in such a way is too trivial to refute Hegel’s position. The second reading is more adequate in that it does not fall into the error that the first one committed, but is still flawed because it introduces a subject-object or mind-world dualism that Hegel denies. The third reading has great advantages compared to the first two readings in terms that it provides a suitable account of indexical knowledge on individuals while avoiding skepticism and dualism which arise in the former readings. (shrink)

In this article, I critically examine the religious argument for the existence of God, which Palmquist formulated from Kant’s Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason. After showing the structure of the argument, I point the problematic point of the argument and focus on the concept of Gesinnung. The privateness of Gesinnung is problematized in the analysis of it, and I briefly suggest that an alternative account of the Gesinnung is possible. Yet I emphasize the advantage that this argument has (...) compared to other competing arguments. (shrink)

Much has been made about the ways that implicit biases and other apparently unreflective attitudes can affect our actions and judgments in ways that negatively affect our ability to do right. What has been discussed less is that these attitudes negatively affect our freedom. In this paper, I argue that implicit biases pose a problem for free will. My analysis focuses on the compatibilist notion of free will according to which acting freely consists in acting in accordance with our reflectively (...) endorsed beliefs and desires. Though bias presents a problem for free action, I argue that there are steps agents can take to regain their freedom. One such strategy is for agents to cultivate better self-knowledge of the ways that their freedom depends on the relationship between their conscious and unconscious attitudes, and the way these work together to inform action and judgment. This knowledge can act as an important catalyst for agents to seek out and implement short- and long-term strategies for reducing the influence of bias, and I offer four proposals along these lines. The upshot is that though bias is a powerful influence on our actions, we need not resign ourselves to its negative effects for freedom. (shrink)

The Education of Cyrus is Xenophon’s magnum opus in political philosophy. If Memorabilia is in the center of his Socratic writings, then The Education of Cyrus is the main work in his portrayal of Cyrus. The Education of Cyrus, as Plato’s Republic, is an educational work in the Socratic sense of the word and hence an original text in the tradition of the Socratic political philosophy. The biographical form of this writing originates from the educational intention of his writer who, (...) by concentrating on the Cyrus’s deeds, encourages the reader to take notice of this question: “what is the best way of life for human beings?” If we confirm that Memorabilia has a biographical form, then we would be able to compare it to The Education of Cyrus. The author attempts to show that Xenophon’s The Education of Cyrus contains a comparison between the Socratic way of life and the Cyrus’ way of life. In spite of showing his admiration for Cyrus nearly in the entire of that work, Xenophon ultimately defends the superiority of the Socratic (or philosophical) way of life as compared to Cyrus the Great’s (or political) way of life. This is the deepest educational layer in Xenophon’s political philosophy hidden behind the disguise of political education in his work on Cyrus. In order to better understand, we should take a distinct stance on the text itself as a totality whose every part serves the whole. By whole, we mean the intention of the writer; and this is the well known approach innovated and applied by Leo Strauss who is the most eminent commentator of Xenophon’s work. Nevertheless, we should avoid the modern dogmatism in Xenophon’s scholarship which tends to depict him as a marginal or second-rate writer. As mentioned by Strauss, Xenophon “had the courage to clothe himself as an idiot and go through millennia that way— he’s the greatest con man I know.” According to Strauss, and his commentaries in Xenophon scholarship in recent decades, there is no reliable way to understand Xenophon’s intention in the Education of Cyrus, unless we use Strauss’s method of interpretation of Xenophon as a first-rank political philosopher. The Education of Cyrus might be read as a logographic text given that every part of the work “must be necessary for the whole; the place where each part occurs is the place where it is necessary that it should occur.” Using this method, the author has tried to show that—in spite of its pessimistic tone toward the political way of life—the concluding part of The Education of Cyrus is consistent with the great admiration of Cyrus as expressed by Xenophon in the most other parts of this work. We examine whether Xenophon’s intention in The Education of Cyrus is to expose the education which Cyrus received or the one he did not. Thus, he emphasizes the contradiction in The Education of Cyrus as a whole, and simultaneously in the other Xenophon’s writing, especially his Memorabilia. To understand the two main Xenophontic scholarly work, and their positions in the hierarchy of Xenophon’s philosophical thought, it is necessary to compare the similarities, differences and particularly as they relate to the limitations in the Socratic and Cyrus’ ways of life, and to analyze how each has affected the other. The aim here was to show the true intention of Xenophon as one of the most authoritative Socratic political philosophers. In doing so, we understand Xenophon’s preferences for philosophical or political ways of life. (shrink)

One of the pressing issues in philosophy of technology is the role of human creativity in human-technology relations. We first observe that a techno-centric orientation of philosophy of technology leaves open the role and contribution of human creativity in technological evolution, while an anthropocentric orientation leaves open the role of the technical milieu in technological evolution. Subsequently, we develop a concept of creation as deviation and responsiveness in response to affordances in the environment, inspired by the affordance theory by James (...) Gibson. With this concept of creation as deviative responsiveness, we articulate the human contribution to human-technology creation, namely, our intentional deviation of the inhibiting forces of the currently dominant niche or meaningful world of human-technology relations, in order to become responsive to new affordances in human-technology creation that constitute a new niche or world of human-technology relations. (shrink)

This paper argues that ethical propositions can legitimately be used as evidence for and against empirical conclusions. Specifically, I argue that this thesis is entailed by several uncontroversial assumptions about ethical metaphysics and epistemology. I also outline several examples of ethical-to-empirical inferences where it is extremely plausible that one can rationally rely upon their ethical evidence in order to gain a justified belief in an empirical conclusion. The main upshot is that ethical propositions can, under perfectly standard conditions, play both (...) direct and indirect evidential roles in (social) scientific inquiry. (shrink)

Rita Charon says that narrative medicine is about honoring stories of illness. In a system where physicians and patients can often feel as though they are reduced to numbers, narrative medicine is a plea to take the narratives of illness seriously. But what does it mean to honor a story? In this essay, I use the framework of narrative medicine to offer narrative reflections on the concept of honor inspired by on three definitions, including respect, moral rightness, and high regard. (...) I explain how each definition illustrates an aspect of honor and its role as an ethical virtue in narrative medicine. (shrink)

The paper focuses on the analysis of conspiracy beliefs and conspiracy theories by taking into consideration some of the major contributions about the topic presently provided by several disciplines. A definition is given that helps illustrate the most prominent features of these beliefs, namely monological bias, logical and conceptual fallacies, dispositional influence and pseudorationality. Other important psychological preconditions are also provided (such as, among others, credulity, hypersensitive agency detection devices and proneness to self-deception), but, as the paper argues, they are (...) features shared to a greater or lesser extent with other belief systems, like radical political ideologies and religious fundamentalisms. As a result, it is suggested that a more proper understanding of the phenomenon is attainable by approaches combining psychological data with the analysis of groups and sociopolitical dynamics. Exceptional contingencies and shifts in power distribution among group/social actors seem to be the most influential factors that explain formation, spread and salience of this kind of beliefs. (shrink)

This is a completely informal presentation of the ideas behind the diagonal lemma. One really can't see this important result from too many different angles. This one aims at getting the main idea across. (For the cognoscenti, it is in the spirit of Quine's treatment in terms of "appended to its own quotation".).

In the Timaeus, Plato’s Timaeus offers an account of the sensible world in terms of “images” of forms. Often, images are taken to be particulars: either objects or particular property instances (tropes). Contrary to this trend, I argue that images are general characteristics which are immanent in the receptacle, or bundles of such characteristics. Thus, the entire sensible world can be analysed in terms of immanent general characteristics, the receptacle, and forms. Hence, for Timaeus, fundamentally, there are no sensible particulars. (...) I end by arguing that my interpretation is compatible with Timaeus’ construction of sensible entities from triangles. (shrink)

A recording or performance of a song is a cover if there is an earlier, canonical recording of the song. It can seem intuitive to think that properly appreciating a cover requires considering it in relation to the original, or at least that doing so will yield a deeper appreciation. This intuition is supported by some philosophical accounts of covers. And it is complicated by the possibility of hearing in, whereby one hears elements of the original version in the cover. (...) We argue that it can nevertheless be just as legitimate to consider a cover version on its own as it is to consider it in relation to the earlier recording that it is covering. In some cases, these two modes of appreciation will offer distinct rewards. In other cases, one mode will be substantially more rewarding than the other. The details matter, especially in complicated cases like covers of covers, but neither mode is privileged in principle. (shrink)

The monograph offers an original account of Spinoza’s philosophy and ethics concentrated on its concordance with selected modern neuroscientific theories. The book proceeds through the whole of Spinoza’s philosophy and by increasingly complex analytical account acquaints with its essential frameworks, terminology, and concepts, and is thus accessible also to readers who are not yet familiar with the thought of this peculiar thinker. The fundamental motives of this interpretation are the nature of the mind and the questions of human freedom and (...) human bondage, mainly in connection with the investigation of affects (passions and drives) that the mind tends to be bound with. In his philosophy, Spinoza not only offers brilliant analyses of human experience but in anticipation of modern psychotherapeutic techniques suggests practical methods for the realization of sufficiently functional affective-cognitive self-therapy aimed at the regulation and control of one’s passivity. The understanding of and working with one’s weaknesses is, according to Spinoza, the necessary condition for realizing one’s freedom, or – for being able to shift from pathetics to ethics. (shrink)

In Risk Management, security issues arise from complex relations among objects and agents, their capabilities and vulnerabilities, the events they are involved in, and the value and risk they ensue to the stakeholders at hand. Further, there are patterns involving these relations that crosscut many domains, ranging from information security to public safety. Understanding and forming a shared conceptualization and vocabulary about these notions and their relations is fundamental for modeling the corresponding scenarios, so that proper security countermeasures can be (...) devised. Ontologies are instruments developed to address these conceptual clarification and terminological systematization issues. Over the years, several ontologies have been proposed in Risk Management and Security Engineering. However, as shown in recent literature, they fall short in many respects, including generality and expressivity - the latter impacting on their interoperability with related models. We propose a Reference Ontology for Security Engineering (ROSE) from a Risk Treatment perspective. Our proposal leverages on two existing Reference Ontologies: the Common Ontology of Value and Risk and a Reference Ontology of Prevention, both of which are grounded on the Unified Foundational Ontology (UFO). ROSE is employed for modeling and analysing some cases, in particular providing clarification to the semantically overloaded notion of Security Mechanism. (shrink)

Addiction theorists have often utilized the metaphor of the blind men and the elephant to illustrate the complex nature of addiction and the varied methodological approaches to studying it. A common purported upshot is skeptical in nature: due to these complexities, it is not possible to offer a unifying account of addiction. I think that this is a mistake. The elephant is real – there is a there there. Here, I defend a dispositionalist account of addiction as the systematic disposition (...) to fail to control one’s desires to engage in certain types of behaviors. I explain this position, defend the inclusion of desires and impaired control, and flesh out the notion of systematicity central to my account. I then try to show how my dispositionalist framework can unify the disparate, seemingly incompatible accounts of addiction (and their respective methodological approaches). I close with a brief plan to extend and implement my account. (shrink)

What is the connection between justification and truth in moral epistemology? The primary goal of this paper is to argue that you cannot have justified false beliefs about your own moral obligations. The secondary goal is to explain why not. Some epistemologists embrace a global truth-connection in epistemology, according to which epistemic justification is always factive. In contrast, I endorse a local truth-connection in moral epistemology, which says that epistemic justification is factive when it concerns your own moral obligations. To (...) explain this, I appeal to a version of moral rationalism, which says there are necessary truths about morality that everyone has a priori justification to believe. (shrink)

Kahneman's 'Asian disease' has nothing to do with Asians or their diseases; it is disrespectful of the basic principles of psychology. The attendant research--fooling people--is not science. Here I show how to build a science of the mind.

Many traditional martial artists assert that MMA is not a martial art, denying that the ‘martial skill’ of MMA constitutes a ‘martial art’, and citing the sportive and entertainment aspects of MMA competitions as antithetical to the spirit of martial arts, lacking the integrity, discipline, and tradition found in martial arts. Today, these criticisms are even more relevant in light of the fact that the typical MMA fighter no longer practices a single discipline but is versed in a variety of (...) techniques and utilizes a variety of strength and conditioning modalities. In addition, with the development of social media and mainstream media’s acceptance of MMA as a legitimate sport, MMA is now more than ever about entertainment. We argue that MMA is a martial art, but it is not always practiced as one. By drawing upon Socrates’ distinction in Plato’s Gorgias between ‘knacks’ and ‘crafts’, we clarify the difference between ‘martial skills’ and ‘martial arts’. Using this distinction, we examine whether the sportive and entertainment aspects of MMA are, in fact, antithetical to the spirit of martial arts. We argue that the latter is, but the former is not. (shrink)

This book draws on Iris Murdoch's philosophy to explore questions related to the importance of attention in ethics. In doing so, it also engages with Murdoch's ideas about the existence of a moral reality, the importance of love, and the necessity but also the difficulty, for most of us, of fighting against our natural self-centred tendencies. Why is attention important to morality? This book argues that many moral failures and moral achievements can be explained by attention. Not only our actions (...) and choices, but the possibilities we choose among, and even the meaning what we perceive, are to a large extent determined by whether we pay attention, and what we attend do. In this way, the book argues that attention is fundamental, though often overlooked, in morality. While the book's discussion of attention revolves primarily around Murdoch's thought, it also engages significantly with Simone Weil, who introduced the concept of attention in a spiritual context. The book also engages with contemporary debates concerning moral perception and motivation, empirical psychology, animal ethics, and Buddhist philosophy. The Ethics of Attention will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working on Iris Murdoch, Simone Weil, ethics and moral psychology, and the philosophy of attention. (shrink)

This paper clarifies the relationship between the Triviality Results for the conditional and the Restrictor Theory of the conditional. On the understanding of Triviality proposed here, it is implausible—pace many proponents of the Restrictor Theory—that Triviality rests on a syntactic error. As argued here, Triviality arises from simply mistaking the feature a claim has when that claim is logically unacceptable for the feature a claim has when that claim is unsatisfiable. Triviality rests on a semantic confusion—one which some semantic theories, (...) but not others, are prone to making. On the interpretation proposed here, Triviality Results thus play a theoretically constructive role in the project of natural language semantics. (shrink)

The application of statistical methods and models both in the natural and social sciences is nowadays a trivial fact which nobody would deny. Bold analogies even suggest the application of the same statistical models to fields as different as statistical mechanics and economics, among them the case of the young and controversial discipline of Econophysics . Less trivial, however, is the answer to the philosophical question, which has been raised ever since the possibility of “commuting” statistical thinking and models between (...) natural and social sciences emerged: whether such a methodological kinship would imply some kind of more profound unity of the natural and the social domain. Starting with Adolphe Quetelet (1796-1874) and ending with the Vienna Circle (from the late 1920s until the 1940s), this paper offers a brief historical and philosophical reconstruction of some important stages in the development of statistics as “commuting” between the natural and the social sciences. This reconstruction is meant to highlight (with respect to the authors under consideration): (1) the existence of a significant correlation between the readiness to “transfer” statistical thinking from natural to social sciences and vice versa, on the one hand, and the standpoints on the issue of the unity/disunity of science, on the other; (2) the historical roots and the fortunes of the analogy between statistical models of society and statistical models of gases. (shrink)

This article is intended as a contribution to the current debates about the relationship between politics and the philosophy of science in the Vienna Circle. I reconsider this issue by shifting the focus from philosophy of science as theory to philosophy of science as practice. From this perspective I take as a starting point the Vienna Circle’s scientific world-conception and emphasize its practical nature: I reinterpret its tenets as a set of recommendations that express the particular epistemological attitude in which (...) both the Vienna Circle’s (doing) philosophy of science and its political engagement were rooted. -/- Regarding politics, and referring to new primary sources, I reconstruct how the scientific world-conception placed the Vienna Circle within a neoliberal-socialist political network that pursued concrete political aims. In light of my reconstruction I shall argue that neither the Vienna Circle’s alleged ethical noncognitivism nor its alleged adhesion to the Weberian ideal of a value-free science rules out the possibility of ascribing to the Vienna Circle a politically engaged philosophy of science: the case of the Vienna Circle shows how philosophy of science, as a public activity, can itself become a form of political engagement, even without necessarily entailing a theory of objective values. (shrink)

Unter Philosophischer Praxis versteht man professionell betriebene philosophische Lebensberatung. In diesem Artikel werden eine kontinentale Konzeption von Philosophischer Praxis und eine analytische – anhand von Aufsätzen von Gerd Achenbach und Ben Mijuskovic – gegenübergestellt und mit einigen Bemerkungen Wittgensteins in Beziehung gesetzt. Es zeigt sich, dass diese Bemerkungen als Korrektiv sowohl der kontinentalen als auch der analytischen Auffassung gelesen werden können.

In this paper, we deal with the issue of contradictory beliefs, particularly with regard to Philosophical Counseling: both voices from the philosophical tradition (with no claim of being exhaustive!) and concepts developed by philosophical practitioners will be considered, in order to make clear what a wide range of resources for dealing with contradictions is available to the philosopher who may wish to engage in Philosophical Counseling. Among the philosophical practitioners, we devote special consideration to Ben Mijuskovic and Gerd Achenbach, and (...) this for two main reasons: first, because the issue of contradiction plays a central role in their concept of Philosophical Counseling and, accordingly, it is given special consideration in their writings; second, because their approaches to Philosophical Counseling are so different that by looking at them one can get an impression of the variety of the positions one can adopt in Philosophical Counseling with respect to the issue of contradiction. (shrink)

The present paper focuses on the work of Adolphe Quetelet (1796-1874), the Belgian author of the Social Physics who worked in the tradition of the French mathématique sociale, and of Otto Neurath (1882-1945), the Vienna Circle’s member who supported a “sociology within physicalism”. They shared some important philosophical and methodological positions: an empiricist approach to the social sciences, a unitary conception of the natural and the social sciences, and the appreciation of statistics as a tool for investigating and also reforming (...) society. My paper analyses these elements of continuity between the two authors, in order to highlight how an empirical-quantitative approach to society was (at least partially) inherited by Austrian sociology from an earlier French tradition. On the contrary, most German statisticians refused such an approach at the time in which social sciences were developing in Germany, and they strongly believed in an in-principle difference between natural and social sciences. From a systematic point of view, my paper devotes a special attention to the relationship between the application of statistics (praxis) and a unitary conception of the sciences (theory). Both in Quetelet’s and in Neurath’s work these two aspects support each other. Nevertheless Neurath can be said to have turned Quetelet’s reasoning upside-down: While Quetelet appealed to statistics to claim that the social sciences can reach the same objectivity and determinacy as the natural ones, Neurath referred to statistics to argue that the natural sciences – exactly like the social ones – are characterized by a certain degree of indeterminacy and underdetermination. (shrink)

The present paper has two main aims. The first one is philosophical and is related to the general topic of this volume (Logical Empiricism and Pragmatism): I would like to draw attention to the fact that the issue of classical scientific determinism, despite being ‘metaphysical’ and thereby ‘nonsensical’ according to the Vienna Circle's ‘scientific world conception’, bothered philosophers, like William James and Charles Peirce, who were deeply involved in scientific practice. At the end of the paper I shall raise the (...) question of why it was so and what this fact may suggest about the relationship between science and metaphysics. The second main aim of this paper is historico-philosophical: in the time span between the late 1870s and by the turn of 1900 James (1842–1910) and Peirce (1839–1914) contributed repeatedly to the ongoing discussions about scientific determinism. In this paper I give a general overview of their positions based mainly on primary sources and I embed them into the broader context of the history of the concept of scientific determinism, dedicating special attention to their relationship with a particular French anti-deterministic tradition (Renouvier, Poincaré, Boutroux and Bergson). (shrink)

Kierkegaard's Either-Or is a book about the choice between aesthetic, ethical, and religious approaches to life. I show that Either-Or also contains a proposal for philosophy of science, and in particular, about the ideal epistemic state for human beings. Whereas the Cartesian-Hegelian tradition conceived of the ideal state as one of detached deliberation -- i.e. "seeing the world as it is in itself" -- Kierkegaard envisions the ideal state as the achievement of equilibrium between the "spectator" and "actor" aspects of (...) the human being. Kierkegaard's proposal thus sets the stage for Niels Bohr's "epistemological lesson of quantum mechanics". (shrink)

In 1994, Duverger spoke of a second type of fascism, to which he added a third for the future. This one would be based on spectacle, image, and the projection of myths of success. We are living in strange times, in which we no longer know how to place groups and ideas, we get lost in details, we establish classifications that make it harder for us to understand social phenomena. A shocking time in which the word “fascist” has become so (...) trivialised that it has almost lost all interest and meaning. If the range of regimes is so diverse, if we do not know what we are dealing with, what can we do? And yet fascism remains one of the great contemporary ideologies, the most recent and the most difficult to understand. Historically, it has been the cause of terrible genocides. (shrink)

Alhazen problem of reflection at a concave spherical surface is one of the most discussed problems in optics. It was solved by Alhazen, The number of solution points vary from zero to a maximum of four. However, his solution is known to be prolix. Huygens solved the problem and identified the solution points to be points of intersection of the given circle and a hyperbola. Many other lines of attack were attempted with their solutions. New solutions are offered from time (...) to time. In this paper we offer a solution based on the criterion to be satisfied by reflection of a ray of light at a concave spherical surface. Based on that criterion we show that it is impossible for a circle containing both end points of the path of the ray inside it, to reflect rays from one point to the other. However, for every point on the given circle, we can construct two orthogonal circles (orthogonal conics in general) which reflect rays from one given point to the other, while the given circle is a non-reflector. (shrink)

This is a one page handout, which draws attention to subtle adaptations that H.L.A. Hart makes regarding material from Henry Sidgwick, when he debates with Rawls and appeals to Sidgwick's objections to the priority of liberty. These adaptations challenge the impression that Rawls should have known better.

The importance of the philosophy education program for children and its implementation was investigated within the framework of this study. Philosophy for Children (P4C) is a program introduced and developed by Matthew Lipman. The building blocks of Philosophy Education for Children are education, philosophy and children. In this respect, the current study analyzed the place and importance of education, philosophy, the child in history, and various related implementations, as well as how they have evolved through the ages. The current study (...) delved into John Dewey's Democratic Education Model, which influenced Matthew Lipman's educational ideas and constituted the content of the Philosophy Education Program for Children. Human beings, who are distinguished from all other animals by intelligence, interact with philosophy and psychology as well as with society due to living within a state and a nation by means of experience with the world he lives in. This interaction between experience, psychology, and philosophy was discussed as a whole in John Dewey's Democratic Education Model. Philosophy Education Program for Children aims to develop upper-level thinking skills, think creatively, analyze in detail, defend ideas with justifications, and respect different opinions with philosophical activities accompanied by a sense of curiosity in children. In this regard, the activities implemented to achieve these goals were explored. (shrink)

One of the most detailed early modern discussions of the morality of esteem can be found in the work of the reformed jurist and historian Marquard Freher (1565–1614). Since the question of how much esteem others deserve is fraught with a high degree of uncertainty, Freher relied on the work of other legal humanists, who discussed questions of esteem from the perspective of arguments from the presumption of goodness. The humanist approach to the presumption of goodness integrated considerations about presumed (...) non-delinquency with considerations concerning natural needs, natural rights and natural duties grounded in natural rational capacities common to all (grown-up, healthy) human beings. It advised us to fulfill natural duties that derive from the natural need of being held in good esteem by others, and to develop socially valuable attitudes such as trust and positive emotions toward others. At the same time, this approach was responsive to considerations of prudence, both in grounding the presumption of goodness in considerations concerning causal powers and in balancing the presumption of goodness against a variety of presumptions of badness. Freher applied this understanding of the presumption of goodness to political practice in his role as an advisor to the Palatinate. (shrink)

This thesis study is about the leading philosophers of philosophy of science of the twentieth century Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn and their asserted views about science and scientific knowledge and the method, standard and limit of science. Popper who emphasises the deductive method of science and its standard which should be falsifiable indicates that scientific knowledge should have a testable and falsifiable pattern. Kuhn, on the other hand, discusses the standard of scientificity connected to the existing paradigm and its (...) emerging problem solving in other words he accepts it as a "puzzle solving activity" and terminatively associates scientificity with sociological factors. Accordingly, in this thesis study by taking into consideration Popper and Kuhn's differences of opinion aimed at science and its knowledge, the arguments of development and scientific progress within the frame of their own terminology is being evaluated. Then, Popper and Kuhn's thoughts considering the standards of science and the arguments about progress and development of scientific knowledge is being transferred in a comparable and analytical manner. As a result it is advocated that Popper and Kuhn accept the existence of the change of scientific knowledge based on scientific progress and development and that this change is a change of opinion which is continuing nonstop. (shrink)

The article tries to answer the questions ; what is consciousness? Why would a collection of matter be conscious? It attempts to describe a universal consciousness that is a fundamental part of building blocks of nature. It applies a counterintuitive view of consciousness in that consciousness is not a product of a brain but a fundamental part of the universe.. Panpsychism.

The article discusses reality from a metaphysical approach.

Bu çalışmada; bilim, sözdebilim ayrımına yönelik tasarlanan öğretim etkinliklerinin, 7. sınıf öğrencilerinin sözdebilimsel inançlarına ve eleştirel düşünme becerilerine etkisini araştırmak ayrıca hangi bilimsellik ve hatalı bilimsellik ölçütlerine sahip olduklarını belirlemek amaçlanmıştır. Bu amaçlar doğrultusunda araştırmanının modeli iç içe karma desen olarak belirlenmiştir. Çalışma, 2018-2019 eğitim öğretim yılının ikinci döneminde, Kocaeli ili Başiskele ilçesinde bulunan bir devlet ortaokulunda gerçekleştirilmiştir. Çalışmanın nicel kısmında bir deney (n=29) ve bir kontrol (n=30) grubu olmak üzere 59 öğrenci, nitel kısmında ise deney grubunda bulunan 29 öğrenci (...) bulunmaktadır. On hafta süren araştırmada deney grubunda; farklı sözdebilimsel içerikler yer alan bilim, sözde–bilim ayrımı bağlamında hazırlanan etkinlikler ile öğretim gerçekleştirilmiş, kontrol grubundaysa mevcut öğretim programında öngörülen etkinliklerle ders işlenmiştir. Çalışmaların tamamı seçmeli bilim uygulamaları derslerinde gerçekleştirilmiştir. Veri toplama aracı olarak; Sözdebilim İnanç Ölçeği, Eleştirel Düşünme ölçekleri Takımı ve araştırmacı tarafından geliştirilen öğrenci görüşme formları kullanılmıştır. Verilerin analizinde, karışık ölçümler için iki yönlü varyans analizi ve içerik analizi kullanılmıştır. Ayrıca veri analizlerinde, SPSS 18.0 paket programı ve Nvivo 12 nitel veri analizi programından yararlanılmıştır. Araştırmanın bulgularına göre, 7. sınıf öğrencilerinin eleştirel düşünme becerileri orta, sözdebilimsel inançları yüksektir. Tasarlanan öğretim etkinlikleri öğrencilerin eleştirel düşünme becerilerini arttırmış, sözdebilimsel inançlarını azaltmıştır. Öğrenci görüşlerinde tespit edilen hatalı bilimsellik ölçütleri, mantığa bürüme, etkililik, bilimsel kavramlar içerme, otoriteye dayanma, kaynak içerme, geçmişten gelen bilgi ve çoğunluk görüşüdür. Öğrenci görüşlerinde tespit edilen bilimsellik ölçütleri ise ölçütleri kanıtlanabilirlik, test edilebilirlik, tutarlılık, tekrarlanabilirlik, bilim dünyasının desteği, mantığa aykırılık ve kasıtlı bilimsel jargondur. Yapılan sözdebilimsel içerikli etkinlikler arasında öğrencilerin en fazla hataya düştükleri etkinlikler astroloji ve antik astronot kuramı olmuştur. (shrink)

20. yüzyılın önemli bilim felsefecisi Lakatos'un, bilim felsefesinde getirmiş olduğu yeni bakış açısı ve yöntem tartışmasıyla ayrıcalıklı bir konumu bulunmaktadır. Bilimin yapısı ve işleyişinin anlaşılması için bilim tarihinin iyi bilinmesi gerektiği belirten düşünür, bilimsel bilginin bilimsel olmayandan ayırt edilmesi hususunda var olan bilimsellik ölçütlerine eleştiriler getirerek kendi sınır çizme ölçütünü belirlemiştir. Buna bağlı olarak Bilimsel Araştırma Programı aracılığıyla bilimsel rasyonalitenin nasıl geliştiği konusuna da açıklık getirmeye çalışmıştır. Onun düşünsel arka planında, bilim felsefesinde fikirleriyle önemli yer edinmiş Viyana Çevresi, Popper ve (...) Kuhn gibi düşünürler ve onların bilimsellik, rasyonalite gibi temel problemlere yönelik çeşitli çözüm önerileriyle geliştirdikleri kuramları bulunmaktadır. Viyana Çevresi'nin olgusal temelli doğrulamacılığa dayanan bilim anlayışına eleştiriler yönelterek, Popper'ın bilimsellik ölçütü olan yanlışlamacılığı "dogmatik", "metodolojik" ve "sofistike" yanlışlamacılık şeklinde analiz eden Lakatos, bu analizini Kuhn'un bilimsel devrimler ile geliştirdiği tarih tasarımı ile sentezlemeye çabalamıştır. Bu çalışmada, Lakatos'un bilimsel metodolojisi için öne sürdüğü yeni çözüm önerisi bağlamında kendinden önceki bilimsel görüşlere yönelik eleştirilerini incelemek, bilim anlayışının bilim felsefesi açısından önemini belirlemek ve bilimsel yöntem sorunu üzerine düşüncelerini irdelemek amaçlanmaktadır. (shrink)

We analyzed co-citation patterns in 332.498 articles published in Anglophone psychology journals between 1946 and 1990 to estimate when cognitive psychology first emerged as a clearly delineated subdiscipline, how fast it grew, to what extent it replaced other approaches to psychology, to what degree it was more appealing to scholars from a younger generation, and whether it was more interdisciplinary than alternative traditions. We detected a major shift in the structure of co-citation networks between approximately 1955 and 1975 and draw (...) novel conclusions about the developments commonly referred to as ‘the cognitive turn’. (shrink)

The Road less travelled often leads nowhere. But seldom, the uncharted path is the most sensible journey. Writing on this topic is an attempt to wade against the current discourse, not because it is a perspective from minority but it is a topic knowingly neglected by the majority. Tribal philosophy in India stands in contrast to majoritarian philosophy and hence, either looked down as insignificant or even considered the impossible. But its metaphysics illustrates the very heart of a worldview which (...) offers an alternative to the chaotic human experiences and institutions. This worldview is the oldest yet the newest. Tribal societies have lived the worldview without ever requiring the need of articulation. This paper, in that sense, is an attempt to capture and articulate first, the Philosophy inherent in a tribal lifestyle, second, pointing out the fusion of modernity in the life of a tribe. Articulating Philosophy of a tribal being is not a construction of metaphysics; rather it is a representation of thoughts of an indigenous being arising from her/his association with world, nature and life. Philosophy of the tribal world is the inner voice of the community diffusing through every member of the community. That inner voice of the community brings forth the indigeneity or ‘Adivasiyat’ – a strong sense of connection to land, nature, spirits and community. With modernity unsettling the life of a tribal person, a fusion in life must be sought to preserve the tradition and culture. Hence this paper will point out the outlook of tribals and shall try to bridge the gap between present and the past. (shrink)

According to conventionalist or conativist views about personal-identity, utterances of personal-identity sentences express propositions that are, in part, made true by the conative attitudes of relevant persons-stages. In this paper I introduce assessor relative conativism: the view that a personal-identity proposition can be true when evaluated at one person-stage’s context and false when evaluated at another person-stage’s context, because person-stages have different patterns of conative attitudes. I present several reasons to embrace assessor relative conativism over its more familiar realiser relative (...) cousin. (shrink)

Reflections on Ethical Living, Asia Publishers, (2021). Editor: Prof. Dror Burstein. (In Hebrew) Two academic events dedicated to the book hosted 7 commentators discussing its key philosophical themes: the Van Leer Institute in Jerusalem, and the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. The book has also generated about 20 interviews in the main Israeli media channels.

A commissioned 3-volume (800 pages) in-depth introduction to the philosophy of science, peer-reviewed by 11 specialists. (In Hebrew).

The paper proposes a simple method for constructing ontological theories—an ‘ontology generator’. It shows that such a generator manages to produce major existing ontological theories, e.g., Realism, Nominalism, Trope theory, Bundle theory, Perdurantism, Endurantism, Possibilism, Actualism and more. It thus turns out, surprisingly, that all these seemingly unrelated different ontological theories that were designed by thinkers hundreds of years apart, can all be generated using the same simple mechanism. Moreover, this same generator manages to produce entirely novel ontological theories, that (...) fare no worse than existing ones in meeting the same common metaphysical challenges. (shrink)

淮南子的文本聲景：早期中國的詩歌、表演、哲學與實踐 / 王棕琦 This article proposes that oral performance could be a philosophical activity in early China. The focus is on the Huainanzi, a densely rhymed philosophical treatise compiled by Liu An in the second century b.c.e. I show that the tome contains various sound-correlated poetic forms that are intended not only to enable textual performance but also, by means of aural mimesis, to encourage the intuitive understanding of its philosophical messages. Thus scholars of ancient poetry, philosophy, or intellectual history, (...) despite being habituated to reading silently and observing disciplinary boundaries, should be attentive to these sonic patterns in order to do justice to the poetic-cum-philosophical richness and originality of this text. More importantly, I argue that these poetic forms enable readers and audiences to experience, embody, and, above all, enact the Way through textual performance. Thanks to the sound patterns of the Huainanzi, the somatic processes of aural reading and philosophical praxis can occur simultaneously. Vocalization becomes an actionable and repeatable spiritual exercise, which facilitates the intuitive understanding and internalization of philosophical values. In other words, the perennial knowing–doing gap is heroically closed by the Huainanzi. -/- 本文論證早期中國的文本表演可以是一種具創造性的哲學活動，而非只是以聲音演繹書寫文本的朗讀活動。文中首先指出《淮南子》裏跟聲音有關的詩歌形式不但有助朗誦表演，更能讓讀者直觀感悟書中哲學思想而不落言筌。而 且，這些詩歌形式更讓讀者通過朗讀而實踐、內化書中所述之大道。可以說，《淮南子》對中國哲學的一大貢獻在於它將「知道」、「傳道」和「行道」三者合而為一。. (shrink)

Descripción de cómo las élites del mundo actual han traicionado al resto de la población en un proyecto global que ya solo beneficia a ellas.

In earlier chapters, we described debates between objectivists and relativists over methodology in the sciences, and over science and values. We have been led to talk about the role of value judgments in various areas of thought, but in this final chapter we turn more directly to the age – old question of the objectivity of values. Objectivists and relativists populate debate over this question just as we found them populating other questions we have addressed. There is a general, deep (...) – seated worry about ascribing objectivity two things human – centered. Talk of the objectivity of values seems odd in light of any notion of objectivity that draws upon a mind–independence, since values and valuings are so clearly terms of relation with the judgments of valuers. But neither are judgments of value merely subjective if they result in actions likely to affect the interests of others, or if they are responsive to reasons and criticism. (shrink)

In Part II we primarily studied the key philosophical concept of objectivity through its applications in methodologically divergent fields like those of the natural and behavioral sciences, and. In Part III we will take a different approach and primarily study different defenses, critiques, and reconstructions of the concept. Chapters 5 engages thinkers and schools of thought that sometimes reject the value of the concept itself, as well as those that criticize specific conceptions of objectivity but that still accept the value (...) of the concept of objectivity. Chapter 5 looks mostly at feminist and social epistemology. Some feminist and social epistemologists we will engage in this chapter believe that a critique of the prevailing notion of objectivity and development of a new and more satisfactory understanding of objectivity actually ‘runs to the heart’ of their own research. (shrink)

Contentious debate has played out in the ‘science wars’ generally, but perhaps nowhere has the possibility and value of objectivity been more controversial than in respect to the social sciences and historiography, the writing of history. Most of the individual social sciences took shape and became academic disciplines during the 19th century, and the issue of differences between studying humankind and studying the natural world goes back at least this far as well. How should we understand the relationship between the (...) human and natural sciences? Do the human and natural science share a common methodology, or are they quite dissimilar? If the “sciences of man, of society, and the state,” as Dilthey called the social sciences, try to emulate the physical sciences in their methods, will they perhaps miss what is distinctive about human existence? These and other questions are examined in Chapter 4. (shrink)

Chapter 3 surveys objectivity in the natural sciences. Thomas Kuhn problematized the logicist understanding of the objectivity or rationality of scientific change, providing a very different picture than that of the cumulative or step-wise progress of theoretical science. Theories often compete, and when consensus builds around one competitor it may be for a variety of reasons other than just the direct logical implications of experimental successes and failures. Kuhn pitted the study of the actual history of science against what Hans (...) Reichenbach referred to as the “logical substitutes” logicists used to reconstruct the rationality of theory change. Such substitutes were promoted to show that theory confirmation is a purely epistemic affair, where purely epistemic implies purely inferential. But where the positivists saw logical compulsion as the reason for theory change, Kuhn saw psychology in values as relevant to how theories are actually confirmed or accepted by the scientific community. (shrink)

Chapter 2 primarily discusses Bernstein’s account and its differences both from Nagle’s metaphysical realism and Rorty’s postmodern pragmatism. Trying to diagnose assumptions that polarize thinkers to become objectivists and relativists, Bernstein articulates a Cartesian Anxiety he thinks they ironically both share. Descartes’ anti-skeptical wave of rigor was presented as a rationalistic project of rebuilding an unstable and dilapidated ‘house of knowledge’ on secure philosophical and scientific foundations. His overtly foundationalist metaphor of rebuilding from timbers set “in rock or hard clay” (...) shapes Descartes’ attempt to refute the skeptic and to secure the objectivity of knowledge as pursued by a more rigorous and analytical method of knowing. (shrink)

Interest in the concept of objectivity is part of the legacy of Modern Philosophy, tracing back to a new way of understanding the starting point of philosophical reflection. It traces back to an “epistemological turn” that attended the development of New Science of the 16th and 17th Century. These origins are an indication that what a thinker takes as the starting point of philosophical reflection deeply affects how they approach key philosophical concepts, including truth, knowledge, and objectivity. Chapter 1 Introduces (...) this key concept in philosophy, and some of the history of its use. (shrink)

Starting with Kant’s undeveloped proposal of a “negative science,” the author describes how philosophy may be developed and strengthened by means of a systematic approach that seeks to identify and eliminate a widespread but seldom recognized form of systemic and propagating conceptual error. ¶¶¶¶¶ -/- The paper builds upon the author’s book, CRITIQUE OF IMPURE REASON: HORIZONS OF POSSIBILITY AND MEANING (Studies in Theory and Behavior, 2021). ¶¶¶¶¶ -/- The author’s purpose is twofold: first, to enable us to recognize the (...) boundaries of what is referentially forbidden—the limits beyond which reference becomes meaningless—and second, to avoid falling victims to a certain broad class of conceptual confusions that lie at the heart of many major philosophical problems. By realizing these objectives, the boundaries of possible meaning are determined. (shrink)

Aristotelian ethics has the resources to address a range of first as well as second order ethical questions precisely in those areas in which Kantian ethics is traditionally supposed to be weak. My aim in this chapter is to examine some of these questions, narrowing my remit to those concerning the nature of the good and the authority of norms. In particular, I want to motivate and sketch a non-naturalist Kantian response to the neo-Aristotelian challenge that targets specifically its meta-ethical (...) and meta-normative naturalistic assumptions. (shrink)

History plays an important part internally to the Kantian architectonic. In what follows, I argue that Kant’s conception of history as a unified whole presents distinctive features that are illuminating about the critical and moral commitments of his philosophy, and also conversely, that his conception of philosophy makes specific demands that his philosophical history aims to fulfill. The argument is structured around four questions, each of which I take in turn: Why does Kant believe it important that history be seen (...) as forming a whole? How does he argue for the unity of the whole? What are the specific claims he makes about history? And why should anyone care for philosophical history? (shrink)

Appropriately specified, the question, 'why be moral?', addresses important and legitimate topics of a broadly meta-ethical nature. The aim of the paper is to use this question as a dialectical tool, in order to identify the core theoretical commitments of Kant'sethics. Becausewell-foundedworrieshavebeenraised about the question itself, I consider these first. The purpose of this preliminary discussion is to determine the sort of question we are dealing with and to introduce the main topics for discussion.

I argue that the idea of the good is best understood in terms of a rather unorthodox thesis concerning actuality, namely that what is actual -as opposed to what just is, either spatio-temporally or abstractly- is properly identified as actual if it embodies a value, the value of maximal determinateness.

The paper offers an interpretation of the "Idea of the Good" in the Science of Logic (SL) that is independently interesting and systematically instructive with respect to Hegel's treatment of practical matters.

The paper starts with outlining the problems of determinism presented in Ulrich's Eleuthériologie and then examines what resources are available to Kant to address these problems. Although the initial focus is historical, one of the aims is to show that the problems with determinism continue to be live problems for those who seek to defend Kant's theory. So the attempt to seek resources in Kant to address these problems will also involve an attempt to offer a diagnosis of what is (...) needed for such defenses of Kant to succeed. (shrink)

Rigorous proof is supposed to guarantee that the premises invoked imply the conclusion reached, and the problem of rigor may be described as that of bringing together the perspectives of formal logic and mathematical practice on how this is to be achieved. This problem has recently raised a lot of discussion among philosophers of mathematics. We survey some possible solutions and argue that failure to understand its terms properly has led to misunderstandings in the literature.

In this paper, the author considers the relationship between science and logic through their historical development. Logic is traditionally understood as a system of principles of valid inference by which the truthfulness of a statement is preserved through the transformation of its content. As such, logic requires that those principles apply regardless of the subject matter under consideration. Therefore, it is undisputable that there is a connection between science and logic: science without inference would be reduced only to a bunch (...) of observational facts that we could not make sense of, and where two connect, that is where they border. In this paper the author will introduce logic as a boundary of science, showing that each expansion in the history of logic has in turn had an effect on the determination of science and its criteria. The author will devote special attention to the idea of "science without boundaries" that was expressed at one stage of this historical development in the form of logical positivism. (shrink)

In this paper, the author considers the classical strategies of defense from Hume's argument against induction, and assesses the extent to which they were found to be successful. Synthetic, linguistic, a priori, pragmatic and inductive strategies of defending induction are considered, as well as the question of the extent to which the justification of induction is a problem for grounding scientific knowledge. A new argument is introduced for the a priori justification of induction, as well as a critique of the (...) synthetic and inductive defenses of induction by Black and Jacquette. (shrink)